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Python Python Collections (2016, retired 2019) Tuples Packing

Youssef Moustahib
Youssef Moustahib
7,779 Points
Posted by Youssef Moustahib
Youssef Moustahib
7,779 Points

This works is the code challenge but not in workspaces?

Hi, my code in the code challenge works great, but when I add some numbers to my arguments in workspaces, it doesn't work. please see my code in workspaces below, then my code in the code challenge:

x = (1,2,3)

y = (4,5,6)

def end(*a):

    maxx = 1
    for thing in a:
        maxx *= thing
    print(maxx)

end(x,y)

THIS CODE ABOVE GIVES ME THE ERROR MESSAGE BELOW:

TypeError: can't multiply sequence by non-int of type 'tuple'

MY CODE BELOW WORKS FINE THOUGH. Please help

twoples.py 
def multiply(*x):
    maxx = 1
    for thing in x:
        maxx *= thing
    return maxx

1 Answer

Chris Freeman
MOD
Chris Freeman
Treehouse Moderator 68,441 Points
Chris Freeman
Chris Freeman
Treehouse Moderator 68,441 Points

Good question. Argument unpacking is not recursive. When passing two tuples to a function with a *args signature, only two arguments are seen. The for loop sets thing to each complete tuple. Thus the multiply fails when applied to two tuples. It would also fail is two lists were passed.